I have two young children and after not visiting dunes or things of that nature for nearly 15 years we have just decided to get back into this.

Wife and I went out with two borrowed beater quads but because the rules no longer allow riding double, I latched onto a couple of these Chinese quads. I understand there is a lot of debate around here one way or the other with regard to the financial wisdom of doing this, but since I didn't know if we were going to be doing this as a hobby or a one time deal, I decided to give these a try.

The first trip went very well. The bikes were used by a seven and five year old both of who weigh around 60 lbs. (Very big five year old) The kids had loads of fun around camp and any place where the sand didn't become too soft.

The problem we have is that the quads are automatic and won't seem to engage or spin the wheels when the sand is soft or there is any sort of slight hill. On flat land they will run children and adults around at ridiculous speeds.

I've pulled the exhaust and air box looking for any sort of restricters. The engines do not lug down or die when under load, it simply will not engage the tires with enough force to get the bike moving. I've been told about a clutch adjustment by the person who sold them to me. He strikes me as a profoundly cautious person and I'm thinking perhaps he adjusted these to insure that no take offs were sudden.

That said we've got a Yamaha 80 with three speed purchased and available for the next trip. I might consider another for the kids after this season but would like to get a little more out of these chinese quads for this season.

Nick

 

the yami 80 is good machine its a 4 stroke, check into changing the roller weights on the machine im no expert look at www.raptor80racing.com they have some hop ups and im sure there are others also.that do the same. it all comes down what you wanna spend for mods to make these quads go.

 

welli should of read better your looking for advice on a china quad, it looks like a sunl your looking at i cant say yay or nay on this some people have luck with sunl some dont, i guess there like any china quad , all i can say is redcat ,kazuma, jetmoto, are some of the better ones, they dont make many performance mod for them, but if you change roller weights on the clutch it will help

 

trumptman,

Actually rollers aren't gong to help you either. Your quad does not have them. Regardless of what Chinese manufacture the quad is, it's not going perform that well in the sand. Even the Yamaha 80 is going to have some trouble, it is also under powered. The Yamaha's come with restrictions build into them. The Honda TRX90 does well but I think your going to need a couple of good 2 strokes for the kids to ride on. Hopefully the dune riders and 2 stroke guys will post on what they have and what they have done to make their quads dune worthy.

Hoyt.

I'm sure you already know this but rollers are used in CVTs. Neither the Yamaha nor the ASUN have a CVT trans.

Good Luck.

SB.

 

smb thanks for correcting me, but since he bought the yami already the only thing he can do to make it perform better in sand is to do some simple modsi would assume they would help a little they are just little kids and im sure there not running the dunes with the big boys.

the 2 strokes are definetly the way to go but i was under the assumption that if there not green stickerd for california your limited to where you can ride?

i would recomend the dc 90 anytime to anyone, after my buddy got one for his kid that thing rips.

so if you can use a 2 stroke where you ride and want to spend the money thats the way to go.

hoyt

 

hoytultratec,

As far as the RED sticker and Green sticker thing goes as long as he purchases a 2002 or older two stroke he will be issued a green sticker. You do not always have to purchase new. So a nice used LT80 or some other two stroke would be just fine to ride year round.

SB.

 

thanks for the clarification, now i understand the whole deal.

thanks

hoyt

 

Thanks to those who have replied so far. A bit more clarification. I live in California and I am not going to purchase any two strokes. I know there power to weight ratio is better, but simply put when the law is going against you, I don't fight it. I also don't want to have to deal with two different types of fuel.

That said the issue with the quads hasn't been them lugging down on hills. My friend who I made the first trip back with has nothing but two strokes for his family. His son has a hopped up LT80 with pipe, etc. and the boy can out ride it in terms of power. He'll make it two thirds of the way up Comp Hill or things like that and you feel and hear the bike simply run out of power, lug down and be in danger or quitting.

We aren't talking about such a scenario. We are talking about quads that will run the engine full speed, not lug down and won't engage or spin the tires. If the tires were being buried, hey Nick get some paddles, if it were lugging down then I could see the point of more power.

Perhaps my kids will be there someday, but all I'm looking for now is some way to get these bikes to engage more fully with the set up it has. It seems very strange that it won't spin the wheels at all in loose sand. It will run me (220lbs adult) 30 mph on flat land but won't break the tires loose with a five year old on it. Something tells me that this is more about some sort of safety restriction to prevent sudden take offs.

Nick

 

im not sure where the limiters are built into, but i would start by , pipe, remove airbox but probably not because of sand, definatly a uni filter , change the cdi, that one might have a rev limiter in it.

www.raptor80racing.com . check this out or throw them a email with questions. pic their brain get some ideas, you probably can do better on pricing other places.

sounds like those 80 s are under powered this is about all you can do to get the most out of it.
as far as china quads your gonna be in the same boat power wise.

hoyt

 

I thought I would go ahead and give everyone an update as to how these two quads have turned out for me. The clutches did need adjustment and after doing so these are amazing machines.

First I found out that aside from the throttle restricter, they come wide open in every other way. There are no washers covering the air intake, the exhaust and no cdi cutting out the upper RPM range.

After the adjustment they will haul the kids and even adults through most decent stuff. They have no problems with long inclines as long as there is a bit of hardness to it. They still have some issues with sand because it either requires too much power or the tires break loose and it buries itself. For now at least the machine easily powers through and runs to the limit of what its little frame and body can tolerate. (It has got a massive 14.5cm of ground clearance for example) On hard pack they are insane. I had one take me up a near vertical eight foot hill. (I weigh 200+lbs)

I will have to say it has been a bit of an education uncovering what people mean by running restricted. I didn't realize they were talking about getting machines to exceed 10-15 mph. These things easily hit nearly 30 mph.

The kids (and adults) have probably put 80-90 hours on them. We have had absolutely NO mechanical issues of any sort. This despite the fact they were probably run 10-12 hours a day between my children and other children taking turns on them. I do ponder trading up to some bigger quads but these things are just so appropriately sized for my little ones for now. They can wait and gain a couple of more inches. The dunes (hopefully) aren't going anywhere. I've seen some very nice 110cc machines from the same company that initially were too large but now seem to be coming in right around the size of the LT-80. (The most capable smaller quad in my book) I'll probably take a massive loss of $100 or so per bike and trade up to them. One last item is they absolutely sip gas. I take them out full and might have to refill once the whole trip (3-4 days)

These quads out the door were $600 and that included tax, licensing and green sticker here in California. They've been great. I might try a better plug or a re-jet just to see what else we can drag out of these machines in terms of performance.

Nick